h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Khyber's Kilts and Bristols: Sex, Sexism and Stereotyped Women in the 'Carry On' Films - A87903859
Author: Bluebottle - U43530

The 'Carry On' films are labelled as being an extremely sexist comedy film series, but is this true? Is it possible to measure sexism? Does this entry, through taking into account previously unconsidered socio-economic, political and cultural factors including the Bechdel Test, billing, pay, nudity, cross-dressing and stereotypes, conclude that the 'Carry On' films are actually 4.2% less sexist than previously thought? Does it merely drone on for ages before saying in excruciating detail what everyone already knew to begin with?

Have I lost the plot? Should this be in Peer Review, or a dustbin? Am I just going on and on and on asking question after question without ever actually giving any answers?

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This is a tour de force of an Entry - I applaud the work you have done to pull all this together

I think it does belong in Peer Review, as it is good as it stands but I'm sure people will have helpful suggestions for improvement to make it even better

I myself think a few sections have a bit of a strange flavour to them at the moment, but others are impressively well observed I'll make some comments, but don't worry if you don't agree with them as I'll admit I'm not the best-qualified person to comment on Carry On...

"It has often been said" - is there a link that can be included there?

I wasn't keen on the flavour of The Bechdel Test section - rather than debating what the definition you have selected means, you could just say what your definition means, as other definitions are available...

Eg say something to confirm that in this Entry we count 'Matron' and 'Colonel' as named characters, and consider changes of topic to mean change of conversation, so a valid conversation still counts even if the topic changes ?*within a scene* to one in which men are discussed (I think the mention of 24 hours is a red herring, but it is good to set out the rules in relation to relevant units of time )

When you say 'asexual' do you mean Dr Crow is neither a man nor a woman?

The Carry On Films and the Bechdel Test section is good indeed I like how you analyse the fails

The Miss Oakley section is very good.

I like the Carry On Come Ons section too - fascinating about the 'magic' of clothes choice... I see you revisit that in the Gaze section, too.

I like the section about nudity and underwear but I think given the online controversies about topless men vs topless women these days, you could perhaps rephrase that paragraph a bit - 'do not count' sounds a bit strong, so it could be rephrased as 'won't be counted here' or something... I like the final sentence of the paragraph, though.

The Adultery section started well, about the major male characters failing to commit adultery, but then the Peter Potter paragraph perplexes that, so I found the flavour of the section isn't right somehow. What are you arguing there? It seems to me that some of the scenes are good examples of sexism, saying if a man successfully commits adultery it is the woman's fault...

"it is death for men to enter these safe spaces, which inevitably end up being the place that the series' heroes hide disguised as women." That's another troubling topic, about how much Carry On contributed to the problems trans women face, but not for this Entry.

I like the idea of the Beauty is in the Eye of the Body Builder section, but I think care is needed to get the right flavour. If I read it right, I think the situation is: At the time of Carry On Girls' release, beauty contests were considered sexist so the film was criticised for including one. However, the film itself criticised the topic by including feminists burning bras. (your first question sounds like opening a for no reason; much has been written online about how the answer to your second question there is 'No'...)

Good analysis of the jobs

Interesting analysis of the pay and billings... Interesting about Charles Hawtrey, too... Fascinating about the crew, and how things changed between 1978 and 1992...

There's a lot of egg in the pudding of the Gender of Title section... Does seem worthwhile to do, as it is a valid question to ask whether the titles make people think the films are sexist, but I wonder if it could be made more concise somehow... (good to see the Jack question appear, though, as you told me about your ponderings a while ago!)

Nice concluding paragraph that is useful as a summary of what the Entry aims to achieve. I wonder about the final sentence, though, as it perhaps says the Entry was aiming to achieve something else, or something...

I've been reading more of your writing about Carry On, and have started to understand more about the sexism in it - I now see you've edited the first paragraph and read my mind, setting out in more detail the problems, so that the women in the cast can be brought more strongly to the fore

So a mostly harmless film franchise from a rather bleak time when working people just needed a bit of a laugh. The female roles always came out on top in the battle of the sexes. Some very underrated (and obviously underpaid!) actors too.

Having lived through the likes of Love Thy Neighbour and survived with my morals more or less in tact, I think Carry On was a thing of its time and that last paragraph is so true, we have a lot more worrying things to think about than dissecting the social ramifications of Babs Windsor's dodgy bra straps!

I am stunned to find there's an equation to illustrate how sexist a movie is!

We live and learn.

Thanks for your thorough read-throughs – I'm glad to learn it updated on Friday after all – I was having a spot of computer problems and hit 'update' before I had to dash off to catch a train, so I left it a few seconds before closing all the windows and hoped it would update, and it did. Sorry I didn't get a chance to reply before now.

To be honest, I was beginning to think this was a truly terrible idea but hopefully it just about works. I thought I'd release it into the wild of Peer Review and see if it is fit enough to survive. Looks like you both enjoyed it though.

So my reply from Friday was:

I'm happy to tweak here and there to improve the flow. And of course feel free to disagree – I'm trying to ask questions. If you have a different answer, that's fine – I'm asking questions because I want readers to come to their own conclusions.

I've tweaked the introduction slightly to remove the 'it has often been said'. If you do a search on your search engine of choice for 'Carry on films sexist' it'll come up with pages and pages of links, but I don't want to start the entry off by diverting people elsewhere

You're right that the Bechdel Test section does get bogged down in the detail of how I'm defining and applying the test – I wouldn't want people to think I'm changing the definition as I go along to ensure all the films pass I've tried to cut it down while hopefully keeping the clarity as to how it has been interpreted.

To be honest most passes were straightforward passes, the only case where a change of topic of conversation led to a film passing was 'Carry On Up the Khyber' where the discussion between Princess Jelhi and Lady Ruff-Diamond went from mentioning Princess Jelhi's father to how Lady Ruff-Diamond was about to be executed and the two then plotted to escape - if a film all about the Khyber Pass doesn't pass, what will?
My reasoning for defining a change in topic of conversation being a completely new conversation was this: the conversation begins with discussion of a man and ends with discussing being executed. Now if someone said to me 'Do you think that Mrs Peel in 'The Avengers' is one of the most attractive women ever, oh and by the way you're about to be executed' – the 'you're about to be executed' is definitely a whole different conversation to 'is Mrs Peel attractive?' even though technically they're both in the same sentence. General small talk is one thing, death threats are clearly a whole different topic with a much greater degree of urgency. So I divided that conversation in two and stand by my decision to do so, but if you disagree I'm happy to debate the point.

Ah yes – You're right about the Adultery section. When I started it I didn't think any male character had committed adultery, but after I wrote it I remembered Carry On Camping's Peter Potter (the name 'Peter Potter' appears in more than one Carry On, played by different characters) and Carry On Screaming and didn't want to delete everything I'd already written, so I tried to Bung a new paragraph into a Potter-shaped hole.

The first half was intended to be positive and the second half negative to counterbalance, but this just made it seem a mixed message. I've added a break and subheader so it should be easier to differentiate the two sides so it doesn't come across that I'm trying to make a negative sound positive and vice versa.

Charles Hawtrey has the biggest jump from number of scenes appeared in to billing, as he had a contract promising that he would always be billed in the top 3 (except when his appearance was a cameo), which producer Peter Rogers interpreted to mean he was always billed third. He desperately wanted to be top-billed and never was.

Let me know if there are still some bits which aren't as clear as they could be or don't flow well.

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Thanks for your detailed reply. Yes, it definitely is a worthwhile idea - I found a similar analysis yesterday, and yours contains other details that build a rich picture so it will be an asset to the Guide when it has finished brewing.

The Entry is shaping up nicely

The Bechdel Test section has been polished well. Yes, I agree that it is reasonable to divide the conversation in two when the topics are clearly distinct and one of them is not about men.

That is a strange episode for Carry On Girls to include, about the public convenience - seems a massively contrived setup just to make a sexist joke about how women use the loo...

The 'Is All Affair in Love and War?' section is good. I think the first sentence is not needed, though, because it is very interesting that, in contrast to the previous paragraphs, in Carry On married women are able to commit adultery easily...

The Beauty in the Eye of the Bodybuilder section is much improved, but it would benefit from examples of beauty queens who went on to have film careers.

I've added a few examples as requested, however as I don't follow beauty pageants I must admit that my knowledge of successful beauty queens who became actresses might be considered to have a limited focus.

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Oh, and I meant to ask - was the similar analysis of the 'Carry On' films specifically, or general other films?

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Thanks for the update - very good examples

http://carryonfan.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/were-carry-ons-sexist.html Here it is

I didn't think I'd be the first to look at this. Well worth reading to compare the topic from a slightly different perspective. I think we both agree on most points, especially that the pay was the biggest insult to the actresses. (I still feel that saying 'the actresses were paid half the amount of the men' is misleading while being in complete agreement that they should have been paid more. It is true, Joan Sims, Barbara Windsor and Hattie Jacques were paid half the amount paid to Kenneth Williams and Sid James, but so too were Kenneth Connor, Jim Dale, Bernard Bresslaw, Jack Douglas, Terry Scott and Peter Butterworth. They all should have been given a decent wage and, more importantly, royalties from when the films were rebroadcast and when their images were used.)

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Yes indeed...

I've been thinking about this Entry quite a bit over the last few weeks as it has real potential, and I again applaud you for pulling it all together, but I'm not sure it is living up to that potential yet...

Having pondered some more, I have further suggestions:
Your opening paragraph is strong, but then the Entry seems to fade out. Not helped by the Entry being really long (over 8,000 words) so I as a reader fade out halfway through, never mind anything else...

I'm thinking it is possibly two Entries in one - on the one hand you have a really detailed and useful 'Carry On Facts and Figures' Entry, setting out the fine information about the Bechdel Test, nudity, drag and suchlike, and then on the other hand you have a valuable essay comparing sexism in Carry On to sexism in 21st Century Hollywood blockbusters using illustrative examples.

It reminds me of my Sofia Kovalevskaya Entry, where it was a long Entry, and I kept it as is, but I made a copy so I could modify the one in Peer Review to suit h2g2.

As an essay, your grade is probably around C at the moment, because your knowledge is excellent but you've been deducted marks for going more than 50% over the word limit and you haven't focused your argument very well so the conclusion is weak compared to the introduction. However, there's definitely potential for an A* with a bit of work... If you take your opening paragraph and carry on from there step by step, I think you would gather the focused information you need along the way and ultimately locate the strong conclusion the Entry is promising.

Ah – I wasn't writing an essay so I deliberately kept it open-ended in the hope that the reader will come to their own conclusion. So I've essentially said 'you've heard the evidence, make up your own mind'.

It could well have been longer, you know. I was considering a section which had the title 'There is Nothing Like A Dame' (I reused the title) that would have looked at the Honours given to the Carry On cast.
Honours are given on a tiered basis, with Member (MBE) at the bottom, a title held by Kenneth Connor, Jim Dale and Bill Owen, then the next level up is Officer (OBE), which honour Joan Hickson held, then Commander such as Leslie Phillips, then Knight or Dame (KBE/DBE) such as Dame June Whitfield and Dame Barbara Windsor, with GBE (Grand Knight/Dame Commander) at the top but rarely awarded. I was quite interested in the reaction Barbara Windsor received in the press when her honour was announced, namely that some felt she did not deserve it. Would, say, Kenneth Williams have received the same reception if he had lived long enough to be awarded the KBE? A possibly interesting question, but any answer would be pure speculation so I cannot justify its inclusion.

I made a couple of tweaks.

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Ah, I see, sorry...

I like the concluding paragraph - 'mostly harmless' indeed

I see you have included some intermediate conclusions along the way which helps a little bit with following the thread of the narrative...

However, I still have the problem that I think your original premise is a great idea, but the massive amount of information detail in between the introduction and conclusion comes across as you telling us everything you know, just because you can, whether we like it or not...

On the one hand, this would probably do well in the statistics because it is packed full of keywords, but on the other hand is it actually a Guide Entry for people to read, or something else?

I liked your Railway Carriages Entry and thought this was going to be something similar, but I still think this would do better to be split into eg Detailed Facts and Figures and Commentary with Examples, because 8,500 words in one go with such a thin thread of justification for the inclusion of each minute detail is too much for me...

Sorry

I hope you'll forgive me if before I make any radical changes to the entry I'll see if anyone else wishes to express an opinion one way or another? What do other readers of this entry think? I must admit I'm not convinced there's a natural dividing point, but what would you want to leave out?

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Yes, I would like more people to express their opinion indeed, as I'm still not the best-qualified person to comment

No, there's not a natural dividing point - it would be a bit of a challenge to untwist the two threads I think you've got going on (detailed stats vs handy comparison)...

I've been obsessing over 8,500 words at some unknown time of the morning, as I do, but in the cold light of day I know you didn't mean to give me the heebeegeebees so it will be fine...

I had a quick look and yes, this entry is indeed 8,353 words long - which is definitely above average word length, but much shorter than my longest accepted entry which was over 12,000

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*reaches for the smelling salts* Which one was that?

Sorry I'm struggling with your Carry On Entries for some reason - I'll take a break in Narnia for a while

I've tweaked this so that is now a mere 7,993 words. It's wasting away, I tell ye, wasting away!
Oh, and the longer entry was the one on favourite authors.

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Ah, yes I can honestly say that I haven't read the Children's Authors Entry in full, although I have dipped into it numerous times - the structure of it allows for that, which is good I admire the Sub-editor, though!

I saw this http://www.facebook.com/awomanontheinternet/photos/a.999768130034227.1073741829.998717626805944/2067327299944966/?type=3 and thought of the 'Beauty in the Eye of the Bodybuilder' section... Encapsulates something about why I found that section to have a strange flavour, I think...